UO

jdluvr06

novella1186 said:

UO (?) Brad Pitt looks gross and creepy with long hair. No, Brad. Just no. 

Ha! That is funny because I feel the exact opposite. I think he looks dorky with short hair.

I love watching Bob Ross.

chibiyui

hellosweetie1015 said:

dallasbetch said:

Probably a UO (&since someone mentioned elf on the shelf): If we do have kids, I'm leaning towards not lying to them about Santa.

See, my concern with this is that either: 

A ) I would have that little asshole that went around telling his/her pre-k classmates that Santa wasn't real and it was just their parents pretending. (FI's personality makes me worry this)

or

B ) My kid would be so sad that Santa didn't come to his/her house, even though he went to all the other kids' houses, and think it was because of something s/he had done. (My personality makes me worry this.)

ETA: I had to remove that stupid smiley. Why did they start making emoticons out of smileys?

(Disclaimer: I understand that personality is not necessarily an inherited trait, per se - I understand that our children may not have any of our personality traits - but I also know that often, kids have their parents' personality traits in a mixture of some sort, whether by nature or by nurture or some combination of the two.)

Our kid will believe in Santa if only because I KNOW any kid of ours would be the little asshole to ruin it for other kids. 

mikenberger

jdluvr06 said:

UO (?) Brad Pitt looks gross and creepy with long hair. No, Brad. Just no. 

Ha! That is funny because I feel the exact opposite. I think he looks dorky with short hair. I love watching Bob Ross.

He's the best. I love watching him paint. Did you know the afro was a total accident and not really his hair type? He permed it once to save money on haircuts and it kind of became his trademark. True story. Wiki told me.

hellosweetie1015

chibiyui said:

hellosweetie1015 said:

dallasbetch said:

Probably a UO (&since someone mentioned elf on the shelf): If we do have kids, I'm leaning towards not lying to them about Santa.

See, my concern with this is that either: 

A ) I would have that little asshole that went around telling his/her pre-k classmates that Santa wasn't real and it was just their parents pretending. (FI's personality makes me worry this)

or

B ) My kid would be so sad that Santa didn't come to his/her house, even though he went to all the other kids' houses, and think it was because of something s/he had done. (My personality makes me worry this.)

ETA: I had to remove that stupid smiley. Why did they start making emoticons out of smileys?

(Disclaimer: I understand that personality is not necessarily an inherited trait, per se - I understand that our children may not have any of our personality traits - but I also know that often, kids have their parents' personality traits in a mixture of some sort, whether by nature or by nurture or some combination of the two.)

Our kid will believe in Santa if only because I KNOW any kid of ours would be the little asshole to ruin it for other kids. 

That's why the asshole option was the first one, haha. My brain is chock full of asshole things to do/say, even if the rest of me is too meek to do/say them. And FI is just an asshole, haha, so I figure if they get FI's filter we're going to be spending a lot of time explaining why we only say the nice things in our heads and not the mean ones, and a lot of time dealing with unhappy teachers. Sorry in advance, teachers of my future spawn...

fwtx5815

hellosweetie1015 said:

chibiyui said:

hellosweetie1015 said:

dallasbetch said:

Probably a UO (&since someone mentioned elf on the shelf): If we do have kids, I'm leaning towards not lying to them about Santa.

See, my concern with this is that either: 

A ) I would have that little asshole that went around telling his/her pre-k classmates that Santa wasn't real and it was just their parents pretending. (FI's personality makes me worry this)

or

B ) My kid would be so sad that Santa didn't come to his/her house, even though he went to all the other kids' houses, and think it was because of something s/he had done. (My personality makes me worry this.)

ETA: I had to remove that stupid smiley. Why did they start making emoticons out of smileys?

(Disclaimer: I understand that personality is not necessarily an inherited trait, per se - I understand that our children may not have any of our personality traits - but I also know that often, kids have their parents' personality traits in a mixture of some sort, whether by nature or by nurture or some combination of the two.)

Our kid will believe in Santa if only because I KNOW any kid of ours would be the little asshole to ruin it for other kids. 


That's why the asshole option was the first one, haha. My brain is chock full of asshole things to do/say, even if the rest of me is too meek to do/say them. And FI is just an asshole, haha, so I figure if they get FI's filter we're going to be spending a lot of time explaining why we only say the nice things in our heads and not the mean ones, and a lot of time dealing with unhappy teachers. Sorry in advance, teachers of my future spawn...

//////////////////////////////
That's kind of part of the reason that I don't want to even introduce them to the lie in the first place, because they're eventually going to find out that it's just pretend and you have so little control over who they'd hear the truth from. So for me, I'd rather tell them that yes he's pretend, he represents the joy of giving (yada yada) and that some people like to think he's real so let them believe it if they want wink wink.

I think this time of year can still be 'magical' even knowing that he's not real, so that argument has no weight for me. And if they know it's just all fun and pretend, I doubt they'd feel like our house got skipped over - they'd be in on the secret.

Other parents' choices to carry on this fictional thing does not represent an obligation on my and FH's part to fake it too. They'll definitely get presents on Christmas, and when they lose a tooth they'll get a high five and ten bucks.

fwtx5815

Also, if there are any podcast listeners who listen to This American Life, this week's episode actually had a story about how affected a boy (now a grown man) was by the measures his parents took to keep their children believing. The story started out pretty funny and had me thinking "ok maybe that would be a lot of fun" but by the end of it, I was back on the anti-Santa side. It's a bit of an extreme example though.

Idk if FI's on board with it fully though and there are a thousand other more important parenting decisions we'll have to make. We'll see what happens when the time comes

hellosweetie1015

dallasbetch said:

chibiyui said:

hellosweetie1015 said:

dallasbetch said:

Probably a UO (&since someone mentioned elf on the shelf): If we do have kids, I'm leaning towards not lying to them about Santa.

See, my concern with this is that either: 

A ) I would have that little asshole that went around telling his/her pre-k classmates that Santa wasn't real and it was just their parents pretending. (FI's personality makes me worry this)

or

B ) My kid would be so sad that Santa didn't come to his/her house, even though he went to all the other kids' houses, and think it was because of something s/he had done. (My personality makes me worry this.)

ETA: I had to remove that stupid smiley. Why did they start making emoticons out of smileys?

(Disclaimer: I understand that personality is not necessarily an inherited trait, per se - I understand that our children may not have any of our personality traits - but I also know that often, kids have their parents' personality traits in a mixture of some sort, whether by nature or by nurture or some combination of the two.)

Our kid will believe in Santa if only because I KNOW any kid of ours would be the little asshole to ruin it for other kids. 

That's why the asshole option was the first one, haha. My brain is chock full of asshole things to do/say, even if the rest of me is too meek to do/say them. And FI is just an asshole, haha, so I figure if they get FI's filter we're going to be spending a lot of time explaining why we only say the nice things in our heads and not the mean ones, and a lot of time dealing with unhappy teachers. Sorry in advance, teachers of my future spawn...

////////////////////////////// That's kind of part of the reason that I don't want to even introduce them to the lie in the first place, because they're eventually going to find out that it's just pretend and you have so little control over who they'd hear the truth from. So for me, I'd rather tell them that yes he's pretend, he represents the joy of giving (yada yada) and that some people like to think he's real so let them believe it if they want wink wink. I think this time of year can still be 'magical' even knowing that he's not real, so that argument has no weight for me. And if they know it's just all fun and pretend, I doubt they'd feel like our house got skipped over - they'd be in on the secret. Other parents' choices to carry on this fictional thing does not represent an obligation on my and FH's part to fake it too. They'll definitely get presents on Christmas, and when they lose a tooth they'll get a high five and ten bucks.

I'm gonna go ahead and block out the box.

I get what you're saying, and it's totally your choice. I just don't want to be that parent whose kid ruins all the other kids' Christmases. And I really can see it now:

Little Tommy Unexpecting: "I can't wait to see what Santa brought me!"

My Darling Hellion: "Santa doesn't bring me things. He's fake anyway."

Two hours later:

Mommy Unexpecting: "HELLOSWEETIE DO YOU KNOW WHAT YOUR DARLING HELLION TOLD MY LITTLE TOMMY?!"

HelloSweetie: "Oh, fuck, what did he say this time?"

To the bolded: damn, I wish I was your kid, haha. I think I got $5 for one molar, when it took me a week to get it pulled. I never got more than that, and consistently got $0.50 or $1. 

fwtx5815

@hellosweetie1015‌ I'd feel terrible if I found out that my kid was responsible for outing the lie! i think most parents would probably want to be the ones to explain it.

But it could also be a good opportunity to teach my kids to respect others' beliefs and that it isn't their place to be a know-it-all and tell other kids that what they believe isn't real. I wish more people would do that actually.

PrettyGirlLost

dallasbetch said:

Also, if there are any podcast listeners who listen to This American Life, this week's episode actually had a story about how affected a boy (now a grown man) was by the measures his parents took to keep their children believing. The story started out pretty funny and had me thinking "ok maybe that would be a lot of fun" but by the end of it, I was back on the anti-Santa side. It's a bit of an extreme example though.

Idk if FI's on board with it fully though and there are a thousand other more important parenting decisions we'll have to make. We'll see what happens when the time comes

This time of year there are tons of media stories about adults who were supposedly so traumatized by the Santa Lie . . .I just roll my eyes at them.

VulgarGirl

Yeah...I'm gonna end up lying to my kids about a lot of shit I'm pretty sure. I mean, my parents lied to be about a lot of shit. I survived. Nothing big, little lies that as an adult I've realized where my parents way of simply getting through the fucking day and making sure I came out of it alive and not a total twatwaffle.

We'll be doing Santa. I never understood the Easter bunny. Is this some kind of giant mutant bunny that drops off baskets? Why? And the tooth fairy kind of sounds like a serial killer going around collecting human parts. 

But wifey likes the idea of both Easter bunny and tooth fairy, along with Santa, so I'll working on figuring out what the fuck a giant bunny has to do with baskets and why some fairy is collecting teeth of children. Santa I can get behind. Jolly magic dude makes presents and drops them off, you thank him with cookies cause everyone likes cookies. Be good because Santa (like your parents) is watching, and misbehaving means no special treats.

plainjane0415

MagicInk said:

Yeah...I'm gonna end up lying to my kids about a lot of shit I'm pretty sure. I mean, my parents lied to be about a lot of shit. I survived. Nothing big, little lies that as an adult I've realized where my parents way of simply getting through the fucking day and making sure I came out of it alive and not a total twatwaffle.

We'll be doing Santa. I never understood the Easter bunny. Is this some kind of giant mutant bunny that drops off baskets? Why? And the tooth fairy kind of sounds like a serial killer going around collecting human parts. 

But wifey likes the idea of both Easter bunny and tooth fairy, along with Santa, so I'll working on figuring out what the fuck a giant bunny has to do with baskets and why some fairy is collecting teeth of children. Santa I can get behind. Jolly magic dude makes presents and drops them off, you thank him with cookies cause everyone likes cookies. Be good because Santa (like your parents) is watching, and misbehaving means no special treats.

The Easter Bunny scared me to death when I was little.  My parents have pictures of me looking terrified with him.  Santa, I could handle, but not the Easter Bunny. I still think he's creepy.

ShesSoCold

The tooth fairy really creeped me out. My mom told me she was the tooth fairy when I was upset that a stranger would enter my room at night while I slept to collect my discarded body parts.

AddieCake

Right now I am hating all the kids who are terrified and screaming on Santa's lap in my newsfeed. I don't get posting pics of your terrified child. 

theartistformerlyknownas

AddieCake said:

Right now I am hating all the kids who are terrified and screaming on Santa's lap in my newsfeed. I don't get posting pics of your terrified child. 

I LOVE THESE. Maybe I'm evil, but terrified children are HILARIOUS.

novella1186

I'm hating the people who are posting photos of their Christmas presents. There was a girl that popped up in my newsfeed yesterday bragging about her brand new 45" flat screen tv that she just got as a gift, complete with photo of her smiling next to the tv in it's box. I was so so so unbearably close to commenting on it: "And then your house got broken into." Use some common sense, people. And even if it's not a risk to your safety, I seriously don't fucking care about what other people get for Christmas. Unless you get like an elephant and your bringing it over to my house right now so I can ride it. 

theartistformerlyknownas

As far as the Santa debate, I love this answer for when they're old enough.

amelisha

lolo883 said:

As far as the Santa debate, I love this answer for when they're old enough.

Okay, that's a great answer and all but I think I can tell I'm not ready for children/may never be ready for children because I kind of want to barf.

manillabar

hellosweetie1015 said:

dallasbetch said:

chibiyui said:

hellosweetie1015 said:

dallasbetch said:

Probably a UO (&since someone mentioned elf on the shelf): If we do have kids, I'm leaning towards not lying to them about Santa.

See, my concern with this is that either: 

A ) I would have that little asshole that went around telling his/her pre-k classmates that Santa wasn't real and it was just their parents pretending. (FI's personality makes me worry this)

or

B ) My kid would be so sad that Santa didn't come to his/her house, even though he went to all the other kids' houses, and think it was because of something s/he had done. (My personality makes me worry this.)

ETA: I had to remove that stupid smiley. Why did they start making emoticons out of smileys?

(Disclaimer: I understand that personality is not necessarily an inherited trait, per se - I understand that our children may not have any of our personality traits - but I also know that often, kids have their parents' personality traits in a mixture of some sort, whether by nature or by nurture or some combination of the two.)

Our kid will believe in Santa if only because I KNOW any kid of ours would be the little asshole to ruin it for other kids. 

That's why the asshole option was the first one, haha. My brain is chock full of asshole things to do/say, even if the rest of me is too meek to do/say them. And FI is just an asshole, haha, so I figure if they get FI's filter we're going to be spending a lot of time explaining why we only say the nice things in our heads and not the mean ones, and a lot of time dealing with unhappy teachers. Sorry in advance, teachers of my future spawn...

////////////////////////////// That's kind of part of the reason that I don't want to even introduce them to the lie in the first place, because they're eventually going to find out that it's just pretend and you have so little control over who they'd hear the truth from. So for me, I'd rather tell them that yes he's pretend, he represents the joy of giving (yada yada) and that some people like to think he's real so let them believe it if they want wink wink. I think this time of year can still be 'magical' even knowing that he's not real, so that argument has no weight for me. And if they know it's just all fun and pretend, I doubt they'd feel like our house got skipped over - they'd be in on the secret. Other parents' choices to carry on this fictional thing does not represent an obligation on my and FH's part to fake it too. They'll definitely get presents on Christmas, and when they lose a tooth they'll get a high five and ten bucks.

I'm gonna go ahead and block out the box.

I get what you're saying, and it's totally your choice. I just don't want to be that parent whose kid ruins all the other kids' Christmases. And I really can see it now:

Little Tommy Unexpecting: "I can't wait to see what Santa brought me!"

My Darling Hellion: "Santa doesn't bring me things. He's fake anyway."

Two hours later:

Mommy Unexpecting: "HELLOSWEETIE DO YOU KNOW WHAT YOUR DARLING HELLION TOLD MY LITTLE TOMMY?!"

HelloSweetie: "Oh, fuck, what did he say this time?"

To the bolded: damn, I wish I was your kid, haha. I think I got $5 for one molar, when it took me a week to get it pulled. I never got more than that, and consistently got $0.50 or $1. 

I just want to say that I NEVER got more than a dollar for a tooth.  And I didn't know people were getting more (like 5, 10, or 20) until I got much older.  My kids are definitely not getting $10 or $20 per tooth... that shit adds up!!

doeydo

lolo883 said: As far as the Santa debate, I love this answer for when they're old enough.


????????BOX////////////////////
 
I actually hate that letter (mainly the bottom part).  Because yeah, we made you believe in some magical fake dude with a beard just so you could grow up and believe in some other magical dude in a beard (I know a lot of people do believe in Jesus and God, and right on if that is good for you, but to me, it is very non-believable). 

theartistformerlyknownas

doeydo said:

lolo883 said:

As far as the Santa debate, I love this answer for when they're old enough.

????????BOX////////////////////
 
I actually hate that letter (mainly the bottom part).  Because yeah, we made you believe in some magical fake dude with a beard just so you could grow up and believe in some other magical dude in a beard (I know a lot of people do believe in Jesus and God, and right on if that is good for you, but to me, it is very non-believable).  BOXES, YO......

Cool, don't care. 

Obviously that part isn't for everyone. I still think the part about how important it is to believe in things we can't see is valid.

fwtx5815

lolo883 said:

doeydo said:

lolo883 said:

As far as the Santa debate, I love this answer for when they're old enough.

????????BOX////////////////////
 
I actually hate that letter (mainly the bottom part).  Because yeah, we made you believe in some magical fake dude with a beard just so you could grow up and believe in some other magical dude in a beard (I know a lot of people do believe in Jesus and God, and right on if that is good for you, but to me, it is very non-believable). 
BOXES, YO......

Cool, don't care. 

Obviously that part isn't for everyone. I still think the part about how important it is to believe in things we can't see is valid.

I think the explanation of it is perfect. But I would just leave out the whole pretending he exists part and use this an explanation as to why we see Santa everywhere around Christmas time. Like skip the first paragraph and it still works.

AlexaF2014

UO: I have a disdain for purses. Doesn't matter if it's a name brand, or knock-off or WTF-ever. They're just giant and unruly and unnecessary and shit ton of money is spent on them. MIL always seems to get me one a year as a gift, and I feel bad because I never use them and they just get delegated to a box of misfit purses in my closet.

Full disclosure: I have a wristlet, which is basically a wallet with a pocket for my phone and a strap because I can't fit anything in my tiny girl pockets (another thing I hate, but I don't think that's a UO).